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Eastern (pale) Chanting Goshawk or Somali Chanting Goshawk, Melierax poliopterus


Thanks to tconzemi at Birdforum I could identify this bird.

Forum thread HERE


Birdforum


The Eastern (pale) Chanting Goshawk or Somali Chanting Goshawk (Melierax poliopterus) is a bird of prey of East Africa.

Distribution and habitat
It occurs in semidesert, dry bush, and wooded grassland up to 2000 m in southern Ethiopia, Djibouti, western Somalia, eastern Kenya, northeastern Tanzania, and adjacent Uganda.

Eastern (pale) Chanting Goshawk or Somali Chanting Goshawk, Melierax poliopterus

Eastern (pale) Chanting Goshawk or Somali Chanting Goshawk, Melierax poliopterus
Range map from www.oiseaux.net - Ornithological Portal Oiseaux.net
www.oiseaux.net is one of those MUST visit pages if you're in to bird watching. You can find just about everything there

Taxonomy
This species is intermediate between the smaller dark chanting goshawk (widespread to the west and south) and the pale chanting goshawk (southern Africa) in colour, size, and leg length, but not in range. It has often been considered a subspecies of the latter, but because of this disparity between geography and characters, it is now considered a separate species, as agreed by many authorities.

Description
This species averages 49 to 55 cm long, with a wingspan of 96 to 110 cm and a tail length of 20 to 25 cm. Males average 85% of the size of females. Like the other chanting goshawks, it resembles an accipiter but the tail is shorter and graduated (the feathers increase in length from the edges to the center), and the wings are broader.

Adults have grey head, neck, breast, and upperparts, except for the white or lightly barred uppertail coverts. The belly has narrow grey and white bars and the undertail coverts are white. The belly and wing linings are white, the secondaries are light grey, and the primaries are dark, giving an impression from below of a white bird with grey head and dark wingtips.

The tail is blackish above and white below with grey bars. The cere is yellow, and the legs are orange-red. Juveniles are dull brown above with a pale stripe over the eye. They have white underparts with brown streaks on the throat and breast, brown bars on the belly coverts, and faint or no barring on the undertail coverts.

The tail is brown with widely spaced darker brown bars. The rump is white, partially barred or unmarked. They are indistinguishable from some juvenile dark chanting goshawks except for the less barred undertail coverts and rump. Also, the legs are slightly longer at all ages than the dark chanting goshawk's

Behaviour
The Eastern Chanting Goshawk is usually seen alone. It often perches on the tops of trees and utility poles. Its wingbeats are shallow and "straight-arm". It holds its wings flat, or sometimes in a V, when it glides.

Its calls are "a melodious piping whee-pee-pee-pee, and a long high-pitched kleee-yeu", slightly lower-pitched than those of the dark chanting goshawk, or "peeu-peeu-peeu-pee-pee-pee-pee..." in the nesting season, the source of its name.

Listen to the Eastern Chanting Goshawk / Somali Chanting Goshawk

Remarks from the Recordist

Recorded with my ZOOM H5 Handy recorder. High Pass Filter applied in Audacity.

I really tried hard to get a picture but the bird took off all the time. I managed to get a recording and I played the sound back to the bird and I could come close for a picture.

Thanks to tconzemi at www.birdforum.com for the help to identify this bird


www.xeno-canto.org


Conservation status
Eastern (pale) Chanting Goshawk or Somali Chanting Goshawk, Melierax poliopterus
Least Concern (IUCN 3.1)
IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Version 2013.2. International Union for Conservation of Nature. Retrieved 26 November 2013.



From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

www.birdforum.net


Sighted: (Date of first photo that I could use) 8 September 2018
Location: `As `Ela, Djibouti


Eastern (pale) Chanting Goshawk or Somali Chanting Goshawk, Melierax poliopterus
Juvenile Eastern Chanting Goshawk / Somali Chanting Goshawk - `As `Ela, Djibouti - 8 September 2018

Eastern (pale) Chanting Goshawk or Somali Chanting Goshawk, Melierax poliopterus
Juvenile Eastern Chanting Goshawk / Somali Chanting Goshawk - `As `Ela, Djibouti - 8 September 2018

Eastern (pale) Chanting Goshawk or Somali Chanting Goshawk, Melierax poliopterus
Juvenile Eastern Chanting Goshawk / Somali Chanting Goshawk - `As `Ela, Djibouti - 8 September 2018

Eastern (pale) Chanting Goshawk or Somali Chanting Goshawk, Melierax poliopterus
Juvenile Eastern Chanting Goshawk / Somali Chanting Goshawk - `As `Ela, Djibouti - 8 September 2018



PLEASE! If I have made any mistakes identifying any bird, PLEASE let me know on my guestbook



       
                  



                                       

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